![\"Leonardo](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/\/a7e46198-9e5f-46f4-9c86-f9bca1dc5ffe.jpg\")
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With Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic (1997)<\/p>\n
20TH CENTURY FOX<\/p>\n
Titanic was 28 years ago and became a behemoth that catapulted Winslet into the headlines. The Nineties were a tough time for women in the spotlight and much of the attention on Winslet revolved round her weight, with body shaming that left her in tears. Since then a reckoning has taken place, but I wonder what Winslet\u2019s family \u2014 her mother Sally, a nanny, her father Roger, an actor who took other jobs when work was scarce, plus her two sisters and brother \u2014 made of her rapid rise? \u201cFascinated, proud, confused?\u201d she says. \u201cIt is odd to see your sister on the front of a magazine.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut also they were worried,\u201d she continues, \u201cbecause the media was vile, singling me out for relentless bullying. I wasn\u2019t ready to be a famous actress. I was so young, but I felt so invaded. Nothing was nice. People climbed into my garden. I couldn\u2019t go to a shop. I was followed when I had a baby in the back of the car on my way to the paediatrician. It is abnormal and, to my dad, I was still that little girl he helped clean out the rabbit hutch every Saturday afternoon.\u201d<\/p>\n
For years this treatment led Winslet to campaign for women to be happy with the way that they naturally look. \u201cBut I feel like nobody cares any more,\u201d she says with a sigh. \u201cNo one\u2019s listening because they\u2019ve become obsessed with chasing an idea of perfection to get more likes on Instagram. It upsets me so much.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u2022 Artist, model, war hero \u2014 why Kate Winslet had to play Lee Miller<\/a><\/p>\n We talk about today\u2019s trend for women, from the red carpet to your local caf\u00e9, to seemingly inject stuff into their faces and lips, in a manner that makes them all look rather the same. \u201cOh, it\u2019s terrifying,\u201d she says, gasping. \u201cI think no, not you! Why?<\/p>\n \u201cSome of the most beautiful women I know are over 70,\u201d says Winslet<\/p>\n DAN KENNEDY<\/p>\n \u201cIt is devastating. If a person\u2019s self-esteem is so bound up in how they look it\u2019s frightening. And it\u2019s puzzling because I have moments when I think it\u2019s better, when I look at actresses at events dressed how they want, whichever shape \u2014 but then so many people are on weight-loss drugs. It\u2019s so varied. Some are making choices to be themselves, others do everything they can to not be themselves. And do they know what they are putting in? The disregard for one\u2019s health is terrifying. It bothers me now more than ever. It is f***ing chaos out there.\u201d <\/p>\n Yet what really upsets Winslet is not \u201call the f***ing actresses\u201d but the rest of the world, \u201cpeople who save up for Botox or the shit they put in their lips\u201d. She screws up her face, showing me lines to prove that she \u201chasn\u2019t got anything in it\u201d. She then squeezes the backs of her hands, making creases around her veins. \u201cMy favourite thing is when your hands get old,\u201d she beams. \u201cThat\u2019s life, in your hands. Some of the most beautiful women I know are over 70 and what upsets me is that young women have no concept of what being beautiful actually is.\u201d <\/p>\n What can be done? She cites the Goodbye June stars Mirren, Toni Collette and Andrea Riseborough, as well her Avatar co-star Sigourney Weaver as women who, like her, are trying to redress the balance. \u201cWe have to keep being real.\u201d<\/p>\n Winslet and Helen Mirren in Goodbye June<\/p>\n KIMBERLEY FRENCH\/NETFLIX<\/p>\n To illustrate her exasperation she mentions a young woman she saw on a BBC news article about a car crash. \u201cShe looked like a cartoon,\u201d Winslet says, sighing. \u201cYou do not actually know what that person looks like \u2014 from the eyebrows to mouth to lashes to hair, that young woman is scared to be herself. What idea of perfection are people aspiring to? I blame social media and its effect on mental health.\u201d <\/p>\n People often ask her how, as a famous person, she still takes the Tube, but the reason why is simple \u2014 nobody is looking up from their phones. \u201cIt\u2019s heartbreaking,\u201d she says. \u201cNobody\u2019s looking into the f***ing world any more.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2022 Read more film reviews, guides about what to watch and interviews<\/a><\/p>\n Winslet was born in Reading in 1975. She says that because she \u201cspeaks well\u201d people think she is \u201cwell-educated, well-read, well this, well that\u201d, but says that her family actually \u201cstruggled like hell\u201d and the house she grew up in \u201cwas a slither of a building on a terrace \u2014 with takeaways, cobblers and the Co-op\u201d.<\/p>\n In 2017 her mother died of ovarian cancer and it is partly in her honour that Winslet has decided to take a first step behind the camera, for Goodbye June. It is not, she insists, Sally\u2019s story, but given that June dies of cancer while her large family (Winslet plays one of her daughters) gather round, the echoes were deafening. <\/p>\n \u201cThere were days when I thought, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m living through it again,\u2019\u201d she says, adding that due to her own experience she was desperate to get the tone right. \u201cI had to get across the monotony that comes when somebody has cancer for a long time. You become numb. I\u2019ve gone through those glimmers of hope that are then dashed. People say, \u2018There\u2019s a new chemo \u2026\u2019, or, \u2018There is a trial \u2026\u2019 You get angry, then hopeful, then sad and then hopeful again. And then you just plateau.\u201d<\/p>\n Goodbye June is a beautiful film, set at Christmas time \u2014 it reminded me of Mike Leigh at his most human and its script is tender, playful and very British. \u201cI love British culture,\u201d Winslet says. \u201cHow in moments of unbelievable tragedy there\u2019s always someone asking if they can have a pint and a packet of pork scratchings.\u201d Football, pubs, sandwiches, \u201ccrappy\u201d hospital sofas, kind doctors \u2014 it flows with the rhythm of this country\u2019s life as it celebrates the ending of a life. <\/p>\n \u2022 The 25 best Christmas movies to watch in 2025 \u2014 and where to watch them now<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI suppose this film is our way of saying, \u2018Make sure you\u2019ve said everything you need to,\u2019\u201d Winslet says. \u201cBecause this country is useless at dealing with grief. All we know is that someone dies and you bury them in a mahogany box or they\u2019re cremated. There\u2019s no sense of ceremony about seeing someone off.\u201d She gives a heavy shake of the head. \u201cBut some people just die,\u201d she says, aghast. \u201cI know somebody who held her dying mother and screamed, \u2018No, not now!\u2019 I mean, hell.\u201d <\/p>\n With her parents, Sally Bridges-Winslet and Roger Winslet, in 2009<\/p>\n DAVE HOGAN\/GETTY IMAGES<\/p>\n When Sally died the actress spent days by her side in hospital \u2014 as did her children. Back then, her first two, Mia and Joe, were teenagers, with her third child, Bear, whose father is her husband, Edward \u201cformerly Ned Rocknroll\u201d Smith, just three. <\/p>\n \u201cI remember,\u201d Winslet continues. \u201cMy mum was in tears one minute and then turned to Mia and said, \u2018I lost so much weight that I had to get new bras, but I won\u2019t need them now, will I? You should have them.\u2019\u201d Winslet guffaws. \u201cShe\u2019d put them in her bag! And of course my daughter had to take the f***ing bras! As soon as we left, she said, \u2018Mum, I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll be able to wear them.\u2019 I said, \u2018Don\u2019t worry, darling, we\u2019ll talk about it later.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Goodbye June is written by Joe, Winslet\u2019s eldest son, whose father is Sam Mendes. Now 22, he goes by the surname Anders, a name from deep in the roots of Winslet\u2019s family tree. A few years ago he took a spot on a screenwriting course at the National Film and Television School, where he wrote this film. He told his mum it was \u201cinspired by what happened when Nana died\u201d. <\/p>\n With her son, Joe Anders in Los Angeles last month<\/p>\n TOMMASO BODDI\/GETTY IMAGES<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s very shy, Joe,\u201d Winslet says. \u201cHe would be happy to just float around writing poems in the shadows of trees, but something is happening to my kid.\u201d As well as having his debut picked up by Netflix, he is acting too \u2014 he has two TV shows next year, East of Eden and Cape Fear. Which, of course, is similar to his sister Mia, Winslet\u2019s daughter with her first husband, Jim Threapleton. Mia\u2019s film career had a breakthrough year with her lead in Wes Anderson<\/a>\u2019s The Phoenician Scheme. <\/p>\n \u2022 The Phoenician Scheme review \u2014 Mia Threapleton shines in dour Wes Anderso<\/a>n<\/a><\/p>\n She is terrific in that, while Anders\u2019s script for Goodbye June shows a knack for detail. However, this is the era of the nepo baby, when all children of the successful are accused of having more luck than talent. \u201cLook,\u201d Winslet says, shrugging, \u201cmy children have their own thing going on. I didn\u2019t teach them how to act and I\u2019m not a writer.\u201d Yet surely Anders is aware of a spotlight? \u201cIt\u2019s definitely something he feels,\u201d Winslet admits. <\/p>\n \u201cJoe would never want anybody to think the film only got made because of his mum. But I\u2019ve said to both many times that people will say whatever they want \u2014 it doesn\u2019t matter. As a mum all one wants for their children is for them to be happy and there was no way I could discourage either of them from wanting to follow this path.\u201d<\/p>\n We end at the hotel reception, long into the night. She really is a whirlwind of a woman: funny and frank, so in control I assume she always wanted to direct. \u201cI really didn\u2019t,\u201d she says. \u201cAs director, you do not draw breath and I have been raising a family.\u201d She frowns. <\/p>\n \u201cAlso, there is an inbuilt assumption that when actresses become directors they\u2019re not really doing it \u2014 that they have help. They never say that about a man. But I had to feel like I was tough enough to withstand whatever assumptions might come my way.\u201d What changed? What made her take the leap? \u201cWell, I got closer to 50 and just didn\u2019t give a f***.\u201d<\/p>\n Goodbye June is in cinemas from Dec 12 and on Netflix from Dec 24<\/p>\n Two-for-one cinema tickets at Everyman<\/p>\n![\"Kate](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/\/4e60040f-4982-4b40-b234-9f0d22f7137e.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Helen](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/\/a737b838-693a-4d6a-bc0b-2a0f4212424c.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Kate](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/\/fe3f1e58-46ea-4a17-a462-7958de9a2f20.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/\/36d8d1f7-1be7-443d-b579-373e08b3a1a5.jpg\")
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